Sprinter snafu is fitting 5th birthday for boondoggle

To start, I should disclose that for years I’ve taken unseemly delight in referring to the Escondido-Oceanside light-rail line as the Spritzer (as in, a transit option that gives riders a refreshing lift — and taxpayers a cold bath).

In unsober moments, I’ve dubbed it the Disorient Express; the French bulletlike Train a Grand B.S.; the Little Engine That Could Never.

In 2001, seven years before the diesel-powered train was up and running, I interviewed then-retired Dick Fifer, a straight-talking bus driver who’d worked his way up to the director’s office of the North County Transit District.

Back in the late ’70s, Fifer thought the old Santa Fe right of way between Oceanside and Escondido was well worth acquiring as a hedge against congestion along the Highway 78 corridor.

To pass Proposition A, the huge 1987 transit tax, something alluring had to be dangled before North County voters.

“Better bus service wasn’t sexy enough,” Fifer told me. Down south, the trolley was hot, hot, hot. The Coaster rocked the coast’s world. To attract votes, a glossy European supermodel was trotted out.

That’s how an innovative, but practical, transit vision turned into a half-billion-dollar budget-buster, a legacy trophy for Congressman Ron Packard.

Nearly seven years after I talked to Fifer, when NCTD was about to roll out the Sprinter, I wrote:

“The Sprinter is a sleek engine of ‘smart growth.’ It’s a shining monument to the politicians who bullied it to completion. The idea was never to save commuters time and money. The goal was to appear environmentally cool, serve three parking-challenged colleges, enrich pro-train lobbyists and contractors, and promote development along the line.”

Nothing that’s happened in the Sprinter’s first five years of service has changed my dyspeptic view that it was overpriced and oversold.

Sure, the Sprinter, when it’s running, is a sublime ride. North County commuters, many of whom are students with discounted fares, love it.

NCTD’s own statistics, however, reveal that public transit in car-centric North County has worked out to be a zero-sum game.

Consider these numbers from NCTD’s annual reports: In 2001, long before the Sprinter, the combined NCTD bus and Coaster boardings was 12.3 million. In 2012, with the Sprinter up and running, the number is 12.1 million. (Footnote: Yes, a recession hurt the Sprinter but, at the same time, the 2001 population of the cities served by NCTD was about 160,000 less than today.)

So what happened?

The answer’s obvious. Buses lost routes and riders. In 2012, the Sprinter welcomed 2.4 million passengers aboard. The bus system, 3 million fewer than in 2001.

Broadly speaking, North County has spent $500 million to shift riders from bus to rail. The promise of luring new commuters to mass transit has proved illusory. The train line’s value remains a mirage of mixed-use development, shimmering in an unpredictable future.

Despite these dispiriting stats, I always try to find the humor in civic boondoggles.

One clever reader offered as a parallel to “The Sprained Sprinter” the 1974 disaster movie “The Towering Inferno,” in which the builder of a skyscraper is aware of electrical problems but is so fixated on a red-carpet party that he delays sounding the alarm (with cinematically spectacular results).

NCTD Executive Director Matt Tucker would bristle at the “Inferno” jest, but it sure looks as if the district, facing a PR disaster over worn brakes, was between a rock and a party place. At the last possible minute, the plug was pulled on last week’s fifth anniversary celebration. The trains stopped, emergency buses were hired, and the bony fingers started pointing at Tucker’s leadership.

In the end, I’m less concerned about this loopy snafu than I am about what was lost five years ago: 1. the half-billion dollars (with about $30 million still owed); and 2. the opportunity in North County to bring flexible express bus service into the 21st century.

North County had its chance to be edgy. Instead, it bought an expensive 19th-century train set.

Someday, someone smart will make the case for dusting off something like Fifer’s plan.

Who knows? Depending on its returns policy, German manufacturer Siemens might give us a break and take the like-new Spritzers back, bad brakes and all.